Disarmed in Public: Citizens Bleed While Judges Fiddle

Time matters, but judges and law enforcement acts like time isn’t important. That is exactly the problem with citizen’s self-defense in California.

The trial court argued that time didn’t matter. The court said California citizens should carry an unloaded firearm for self-protection.. because, after all, ordinary citizens would have plenty of time to load their firearm if they were threatened. Sure they will.. just like police have plenty of time. (sarc)

Unloaded open carry was the law of the land until the California legislature shoveled out its own load of stupid. The legislature said it was better for ordinary citizens to be disarmed in public all the time. Ordinary citizens like you and me would have plenty of time to run home if they needed to protect themselves. Maybe that works in the fantasy land where politicians legislate, but running home doesn’t work where I live.

Civil rights groups took those decisions to court, but it takes years for a legal case to receive a ruling. After years of litigation, a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit ruled that citizens have the right to defend their lives. The three judges said time matters. Citizens, not police, are the first to meet criminals on the street. In those encounters, citizens don’t have time to call and then wait for law enforcement. Citizens are on the cutting edge. Citizens are the first responders to crime.

That was before the Circuit Court decision was enjoined by a San Francisco judge. So here we sit. Open carry is outlawed in California. Citizens are disarmed, and judges say that citizens have time to respond to an immediate threat by running away. We’ve waited for years for the court to respect the right of armed self-defense. It might take an equally long time for the appeals process to finally conclude at the Supreme Court.

Time matters where I live. The sheriff of San Diego County told ordinary citizens they have no right to defend themselves in public. An average of 134 people per day are robbed, assaulted, raped or murdered in San Diego County. Time matters. For 4100 citizens last month, time ran out. Time matters, and more of us bleed each day as judges fiddle.

Would armed citizens be able to stop all crime? Of course not. That isn’t the appropriate standard. Should citizens who want to protect themselves and their family be allowed to carry the tools of self-defense without legal threat? Of course they should! Armed citizens also protect the disarmed because criminals are guessing who is defenseless. With concealed carry, criminals don’t know who is armed.

Would armed citizens defend themselves even one thousand times a month? I don’t know, but each victim who had their car broken into, their house robbed, each victim who was robbed or assaulted, each victim who was raped or the relatives of those who were murdered, they wish they were armed and protected. They wish they could defend themselves in time to not be a victim. Ordinary citizens would rather defend themselves than fill out a police report after they are victimized.

Judges pretend that time doesn’t matter. They pretend that a judge’s lofty opinion is more important than the violence done to the ordinary citizen every day.

Judges fiddle while the citizens of San Diego bleed.. drop by drop.. every day.

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